Remember you are light, and to light you shall return is a steel-framed plexiglass box containing seventy-three identical sexbots in five alternating rows. They are all masturbating. Pomeroy has offset their timings perfectly; every five minutes, when they orgasm, their heads thrash in a wave from left to right like wind on a field of grain.
“Your technique is beautiful,” says Gillian. “Why is the product so crass?”
Pomeroy smiles a little. “The definition of beauty lasts. That of crudity doesn’t. This will remain beautiful even after the batteries die.”
“You think a lot of your own work.”
“Yes. I do.”
It’s midnight in Mendon’s lab, just as it should be. His shielded clocks tick straight on over the line between Greenwich Standard days, but those on the wall don’t. London, Paris, Istanbul, Beijing: they all say it’s five o’clock.
The webcam feeds confirm it. Dim winter afternoon in a Berlin window, late summer evening in Oahu. If you stuck a sword in a globe you’d hit one of them going in and the other going out, but there they are. Nobody anywhere has noticed.
Mendon flips on all the monitors at once and gazes, fearful, at the metastasis of the sun.
Wednesday, March 16, 2005
The rain’s fat, slow and hard, with a warmth behind it and the rising smell of bruised worms: a summer storm in winter. When each drop has its own weight and sound, thinks Edwidge as she shrugs up her thin hood, it’s easy to give them names and stories too.
There: Wilhelmina, who sings as she falls, to the adoration or envy of her fellows. There: Cruet and Sylvan, who touched at twelve thousand feet and were never apart again. There, Dmitri, who knows what the others don’t: that every raindrop, like every pearl, is born from a speck of dirt.
“Please,” Bianca cringes, “Sophie, listen,” as water creeps from the carpet.
“The FUCK!” Sophie’s face is unpinches and pales. The vase of flowers implodes from the floor up onto the table. She draws back her hand.
“Please don’t get mad,” says Bianca.
“You’re on that shit again,” says Sophie. “That fucking drug.”
“Listen,” says Bianca. “You weren’t–weren’t supposed to be back yet…”
“Hey, what’s up?” Sophie retreats from the room. Her movements have a strange, lazy grace, alternated with an odd sharpness. Bianca remembers the first time she saw it: delight, fascination, this new perspective on how people move forward.
“They never show that in movies,” Jean-Pierre points out grumpily.
“True.” Bertrand tosses out the nine of clubs; it tumbles lazily, end over end. “One doesn’t just freeze in vacuum. One doesn’t merely suffocate. One explodes!”
“The ultimate contextualization!” says Jacques, grabbing the nine and stuffing it in his hand. “An attempt to fill the void with self–”
“Spare us,” groans Jean-Pierre.
“There is nothing outside the text!” Jacques insists. He means this literally; the three of them are in a spaceship made of origami newsprint.
It should be noted that this is basically the worst possible kind of spaceship.
“Do your worst, demon!” grunts Slagjor, as Gr’nThax’s fireburst splashes from his gleaming blade.
“It’s time, young friend,” whispers Poniard Toepad.
“What?” says Token Smallchÿlde, surprised. “But you’re–”
“The beast knows my tricks,” Poniard hisses. “But he discounts you. You’re our only hope!”
Gathering his courage, Token bursts from his hiding place and scrambles up Gr’nThax’s snout. With a whoop, he slides down and leaps from its thrashing tail.
“What?” Gr’nThax roars. “NO!”
But Token’s already snatched the gleaming treasure from its pedestal.<
"At last!" exults Slagjor. "The Next Arc of Plot!”
“Dangit!” says Gr’nThax. “I die in that one.”
Mercy can’t help noticing that hers is the only pink skin visible; it makes her itch.
“Look, you go ahead,” she mutters.
“Don’t wuss out on me!” Vetta laughs. “You’ll be fine once we’re in.”
“What if somebody decides to…?” Mercy grimaces. “Not that I think–” But they’re at the door.
The bouncer scowls, but Vetta somehow gets them in. The music’s thud-heavy, the light in strange spectra, and the dancing–Mercy’s intrigued. It’s so different.
“Told you!” shouts Vetta, grinning.
A guy at the bar overhears, glances back, quirks an eyebrow. Mercy winks. He’s pretty cute, for a zombie.
“You got the plates?” pants Petra.
“Yeah,” says Terrell, “let’s WHOUF.” A big red shape bounces off his face, and he drops.
“A critical hit,” booms a voice. “For the Dieslinger!”
“You’re kidding,” groans Petra.
“Hands up, criminal–”
“God. Look.” Petra peels off her ski mask. “I’m an image consultant, okay? And seriously, this Dungeons and whatever…”
“You recognized it!”
“But think of the zeitgeist! You want recognition with dice, you go with gambling.” She puts an arm around his shoulder.
“Oooh,” he says. “So I could yell, like, ‘Snake Eyes, scum!'”
“You got it,” laughs Petra, and guts him.